Since the Pope died a few days ago, I purposely stopped reading the news. It’s events like these that really force me hate the media. It has nothing to do with the Pope. Hell, I don’t really know much about the guy… But all this news seems a bit much and what’s the deal with not having a casket? I know having an open casket is foreign to us Jews, but being moved around on a platform with no casket? Seems kinda creepy to me… The Jews don’t have a be-all-and-end-all type character like the Pope, but I am sure we’d never prance our dead leader around like that. And it’s not to say we’re better. Who am I to say that. I think that might be one thing religion did teach me. But to me it seemed disrespectful. I guess it’s a Catholic thing and something I will never fully understand.

The rituals you are seeing on TV are like 1500 years old. It is definitely a little disconcerting seeing a person’s body like that, but also, I think it is kind of cool. We keep ourselves so completely removed from death for the most part. I was thinking about this on the way home from work yesterday, actually. Most animals just keel over somewhere and slowly return to the earth. The way we deal with it is just amazing. The rituals, the caskets, etc. It’s like it’s all a big euphemism that we use to soften the blow of the reality.

I’m sure this “open body” viewing has its roots in ancient Catholic history. You know, back in the days when rats ran wild and spread disease; no one bathed and they tossed their filth out the top window. Seems to me that unless his body is shrinkwrapped somehow, this custom could have been modified for the present day.

I hope he is very very well preserved.

Sitting out in the open air for a week–with hundreds of thousands of people milling about 24/7….let’s hope St. Peter’s is well ventilated.

i thought it was weird too. then i was thinking the same thing about how old these rituals are and i wonder if it has something to do with the times when the vatican was a major politicall player and maybe the display is meant to provde to followers that he’s really dead and it’s not just a political assassination charade or something.

well, he signed on to be pope. he knew he was gonna be shipped around on a slab long before this week. and it behooves me to restate, “Funerals are rarely for the dead. They always have and will continue to be about the liviing.” But yeah, the media. They are sensationalist money grubbing assholes. But what did you expect? The National Spelling Bee coverage ain’t gonna pay the lease on my Jag. Maybe Lenin was correct when he said capitalism was bad. I mean, he was dead wrong about Socialism, but that doesn’t mean he can’t bat a .500.